Coinjock Travel Guide

This restaurant was the only one I know of in Coinjock until Midway Marina across the ICW opened a restaurant. Midway used to let cruisers go in the courtesy car to Coinjock to eat as it was a LONG way around to the other side by road.

It is a busy popular restaurant and you can eat by the window and watch the traffic in the ICW.

Favorite Dish: They specialize in fresh fried seafood and a 32-ounce prime rib. I've also had crab cakes and Bob had the combination seafood platter.

In 2001, lunch for the two of us was $24.35, and in 2002 it was $25.99 (including tip). We each had iced tea, and one of us had crab salad, and the other one had a pork chop, baked potoato and cole slaw. It was $10.95 each.

Dinner in 2002 was $30.41, but that was the dinner that did NOT include the 32 oz. prime rib. That was $53.60. The picture includes an inset of the original prime rib with an apple ring, and above it the take-home box with a piece of the prime rib with one of the rolls.

Taxi or limo service is available to and from the Norfolk, Virginia in Coinjock, but I have been completely unable to find out the specifics of this. Several people mention it but they don't say what taxi or limo service they use. It is about 50 miles on the water, and takes us a whole day to get to Norfolk from here, but it doesn't take nearly that long by land. Cruisers can arrange to leave their boats here for a time while flying home.

I think you have to contact a company in Norfolk. One company is:
Park Avenue Limousines
PO Box 11301
Norfolk, VA 23517

I can't find their phone number

There were three three Coinjock marinas which offer dockage facing directly onto the ICW north of the fixed bridge. One of them has now gone out of business so there are now only two. This stretch of the ICW is a no-wake zone, but you should be sure to have your fenders out especially because of the tugs and barges.

For the first two times, we stayed at the Coinjock Marina. It has an a very long fixed wooden-face dock just north of the fixed bridge, with water and 30- and 50-amp power connections. (A face dock is just a long dock that boats tie up to bow to stern (nose to tail) rather than being in individual slips. There is current here, but it is not tidal and it is protected from wind.

Equipment: It cost us $1.15/ft plus $3.00 for electric (30 amp) in the spring of 2002.

Minimum dockside depths are about 8-feet. Diesel fuel and gasoline and waste pump-out are available. Showers and a laundromat are located just behind the docks although both are substandard. There is only one combined shower/bathroom for each sex. Coinjock Marina has an extensive ship's and variety stores with a large selection of frozen and fresh meats is stocked, including homemade country sausage. There are also jams and jellys.

A boaters' lounge is provided under the same roof as the ship's store so if the store is closed, the lounge isn't open. There is a color television where you can get the Weather Channel, a pool table, complimentary popcorn, a paperback exchange library and a desk with an internet connection. They may now have a wireless network.

Favorite thing: Information on Coinjock from the internet:

"Coinjock (KOIN-jahk), uninc. village, Currituck co., extreme NE N.C., 14 mi/23 km E of Elizabeth City, on Albemarle and Chesapeake Canal, Intercoastal Waterway. Resort (hunting, fishing). Soybeans, grain, cotton, peanuts; hogs.

"Metro area: Norfolk-Virginia Beach
Time zone: Eastern"

The names means something about a mulberry tree in the local Indian language.

Fondest memory: Almost midway between Great Bridge and Belhaven, Coinjock is almost the only spot to stopover for northbound and southbound pleasure craft between the Alligator River and Norfolk. There is another marina at Pungo Ferry farther along before Great Bridge, but it is very small. The waterway is so narrow here that anchoring is not really an option.

A Coast Guard station used to be located along the Waterway at Coinjock. I've heard about how rough Albemarle Sound can be, but I've never experienced it until this year, and even then it was no worse than the Chesapeake in similar winds.

Nate (B1ob) tells me that it also can be a stopover on the way to the Outer Banks by land.